Fred McCall, who served Campbell University for 33 years as basketball coach and later vice president, died Friday, March 28. Coach McCall joined the Campbell athletic staff in 1953 and over the next 16 years guided the men's basketball team to a 221-104 record. He directed the teams to five state junior college championships in eight years and also led the Camels through their first eight years of competition on the senior college level. His legacy lives through the Campbell Basketball School, which he founded with Horace "Bones" McKinney in 1956, and the McCall Rebounder, an instructional device used by coaches in all 50 states to teach proper rebounding technique.

Among the outstanding student-athletes he coached were three All-Americans – Len Maness, Bob Vernon and George Lehmann – as well as future major league baseball stars Jim Perry and Cal Koonce, both of whom were starters on McCall's Campbell basketball team.

After resigning his basketball and athletic director duties in 1969, McCall served as a vice president at Campbell until his retirement in 1986. A native of Denver, N.C., Coach McCall was inducted to the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame in June 1994 and into the Campbell Sports Hall of Fame in October 1995. He was also enshrined by the Lenoir-Rhyne College Sports Hall of Fame in 1986.

Visitation for family and friends will be held Sunday (Mar. 30) from 6:00-8:00 p.m. at O'Quinn-Peebles Funeral Home in Lillington. A memorial service is scheduled for Monday at 2:00 p.m. at Memorial Baptist Church in Buies Creek.

Fred McCall: Actions Louder Than Words

The following article appeared in the News & Observer on June 12, 1994, one day before Fred McCall was inducted into the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame.

By Steve Politi

Ask Fred McCall a question about his accomplishments in basketball and he'll answer only begrudgingly. "I'm not bragging," McCall will usually say after he responds. "I'm just telling you the facts."

The facts point to a career that's touched the lives of thousands of budding basketball stars. McCall helped develop the Campbell Basketball Camp, one of the first and largest in the nation. He served as basketball coach and athletics director at Campbell University.

In addition, he invented and patented the McCall Rebounder, a device that helps players learn rebounding fundamentals.

It's a career worth bragging about, but McCall won't.

"That's what took him so long to get in the Hall of Fame," said Horace "Bones" McKinney, a Hall member who will introduce McCall at the June 13 banquet. "Everything he did, he will tell you that somebody else did it."

His peers, however, will do some bragging for him.

"Fred McCall is one of the finest men I have ever known," said John Wooden, former UCLA basketball coach and winner of 10 NCAA titles. "He's a wonderful person in every respect."

Wooden is one of the many college coaches who taught clinics at the Campbell camp, which McCall and McKinney – then coach at Wake Forest – founded in 1956.

That year, 125 youths attended the camp. But word soon got out, and when big names like Bob Cousy and Wooden began to show up, the number soared to 1,500 during the two one-week sessions.

"People were hungry for basketball then," McKinney said. "And we were the first camp – all of the others came after us. And hey, we were cheap."

For $25 young stars could learn basketball with the best. "The kids enjoyed it," McCall remembered. "The food was good, the housing was good. A crowd attracts a crowd, and they had wonderful instructors."

While serving as camp director, McCall was coaching the Campbell basketball team. He compiled a 221-104 record as coach, winning five championships at the junior college level.

"You didn't worry about the percentages," he said. "You just took more shots than the other team and made more goals. They say defense wins. I have never seen a defense put the ball through the hoop."

His teams missed a lot of shots, and McCall quickly found that good rebounding was a key to success. That's why he developed a rebounding machine to help strengthen a player's ability to snatch down a ball off the boards.

"I used it when I was coaching at Wake Forest," McKinney said. "He tried to get me to go in with him, and I told him, `Fred, you're just wasting your time,' That's what Roebuck said to Sears."

McCall developed the Rebounder and sold the patent. The machine became an instant success.

"It's not only known nationally," McKinney said. "The Rebounder in every gym across the world was developed by Fred McCall."

The machine looks like a large wire basket sitting on top of a pole. It adjusts for the height and stretch of the player, and helps improve his reflexes and strength.

"It definitely has been helpful," Wooden said. "Basketball coaches are always concerned with rebounding. Most believe if you can control rebounding, you can control the game."

McCall's daughters recently gave their father a box filled with memorabilia, much of it from his coaching career at Campbell. "I had never kept a thing," he said.

Some of the pictures dated back to his college days at Lenoir-Rhyne, where McCall was a three-sport star. After he graduated, McCall started a baseball career in the minor leagues, playing on the same team as New York Giant great Bobby Thomson.

McCall and his wife, Pearl, moved to Buies Creek in 1952. At Campbell, McCall has gone from coach and teacher to athletics director to administrator to executive vice president. He retired in 1986. His contributions to Campbell weren't overlooked by his peers – they named a building for him in 1973.

Still, McCall doesn't consider the Rebounder his greatest accomplishment. Or the Campbell camp. Or his coaching record.

"It's staying here at Campbell University, rearing a family of three and (having) and nice, nice wife."

And that's something he's willing to brag about.

Reprinted with permission of The News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina.